If the Torrance City Council censures Mayor Pat Furey and forces his son to resign as a commissioner in response to illegal campaign contributions, the catalyst may be a city ethics policy the elder Furey himself helped craft.

Furey was a member of the Blue Ribbon Committee on Ethics and Integrity that published a 37-page report in January 2008, just months before he was elected to the City Council. Furey worked as a lawyer for Los Angeles County at the time.

The report later became the basis of a municipal ethics policy that officials pledge to uphold.

“He was one of the ones leading the charge,” recalled former Mayor Frank Scotto, who spearheaded the creation and adoption of the policy to fulfill a campaign promise.

“That’s what’s so incredible,” Scotto added. “He was very upset about the activities of a mayor that preceded me.”

Ethics violations

Furey and his son, Patrick Furey Jr., a city traffic commissioner who also served as his father’s campaign manager in his successful 2014 mayoral campaign, are at the center of an ethical scandal virtually unheard of by the standards of conservative Torrance.

The pair admitted violating the state’s Political Reform Act by coordinating illegal campaign contributions with a supposedly independent political action committee that supported the senior Furey’s candidacy.

The illegal coordination also broke Torrance campaign laws restricting candidates to $1,000 in direct contributions from an entity or individual, the FPPC noted, sparking a review by the Public Integrity Division of the District Attorney’s Office for possible prosecution.

City Council response

Their biggest punishment so far: a decision by the City Council last week to discuss at their next meeting whether to send the younger Furey a letter requesting his resignation.

A second proposal — to consider his removal from the volunteer position at next week’s meeting should he not agree to step down — failed to gain traction.

With the mayor abstaining, the panel deadlocked 3-3, with Furey’s political allies — Councilmen Tim Goodrich, Geoff Rizzo and Kurt Weideman — declining to support the move by Councilman Mike Griffiths.

Griffiths had wanted a back-up action item — public notice is required of such agenda items in advance — that was “ready to go” if Furey’s resignation was not offered.

“If he resigns, this item is unnecessary,” Griffiths said. “Now we have nothing.”

As of Friday, Furey had not yet resigned and did not indicate via email that he intended to do so.

“I serve at the pleasure of the council,” the younger Furey said via email March 17. “If they feel they no longer want me to volunteer my time and expertise, they should contact me and express that. As of today, none of them have done so.”

His father has adopted a similar position.

“With regard to removal of my son as a volunteer commissioner, it would seem that if that is the wish of council the appropriate way to handle it would be to meet with him to discuss that issue,” the mayor wrote via email March 17. “That just seems to me a common courtesy!”

The mayor reiterated Saturday via email that no one — elected or otherwise — has contacted his son about a resignation.

To some observers, that stance merely seems to delay the inevitable because the council appears to have the votes to remove Furey Jr.

“I want to give him the opportunity to resign,” said Rizzo, who received the concurrence of a majority of his colleagues to discuss writing the letter.

“You ask somebody to do something first before you make him do something,” Rizzo added. “The civil thing to do is give him an opportunity to resign. Then, if he doesn’t, we would have to take further action. I’m just hoping we don’t have to take that further action.”

Still, Goodrich — who failed to support either Griffiths’ or Rizzo’s attempts to put a mechanism in place to punish Furey Jr. — noted that, unlike the mayor’s son, Plourde was given the “professional courtesy” of resigning privately before the affair was made public.

Goodrich also questioned whether the state fine and hit to the younger Furey’s reputation was sufficient punishment.

“There’s a lot we’re working on,” Goodrich said. “I’ve only heard from about five people in the community that have raised concerns about this. Should those five people distract from the work that we’re doing to help 150,000 people?”

Critics cite ethics code

Still, critics note the ethics code appears to have been violated in numerous ways by the mayor and his son.

• Make decisions based solely on the best interests of the city of Torrance and recuse themselves at any instance of potential conflict.

• Take responsibility for their actions regardless of their outcome.

• Never excuse or ignore inappropriate activities.

• Neither maintain nor support any hidden agenda.

• Acknowledge that public perception is important and recognize that they are ethically bound to do more than is required of them and less than is allowed by law.

• Uphold the public trust by never using city assets, information or relationships for personal gain.

“Patrick Furey has not met these ethical standards,” said Mike Moran, a board member with the Southwood Riviera HOA. “Enough. We are not Bell or Hawthorne or Carson. This is Torrance and the citizens deserve better.”

Linda Gottschall Sayed, a lawyer and former president of the West Torrance HOA, said that when she worked with now-Mayor Furey on the committee that formulated the ethics policy, he “enthusiastically” plunged himself into the work.

“He took a vital role as an outspoken member,” she recalled of Furey’s role. “That’s why I’m so angry. That’s why I am so hurt.”

“There is no penalty for breaking our rules,” Scotto conceded. “It was very difficult for us to create penalties for different ethical breaches.”

Sayed said the combination of a rule with no punitive measures and a “silly protracted process” and “laughable” response from a City Council reticent to punish one of its own further undermines any commitment to city ethics.

“If (Furey Jr.) was going to resign, wouldn’t he have already?” she said. “Wouldn’t someone with ethics have already taken that step?”

Veteran journalist Nick Green is the beat reporter for the cities of Torrance, Carson and Lomita and also covers the South Bay's rapidly growing craft beer industry for the Daily Breeze. He has worked for newspapers on the West Coast since graduating in 1987 from the University of Washington and lives in Old Torrance with his wife and two cats. Follow him on Twitter @NickGreen007 and @BeerGogglesLA.